Page:The life and opinions of Tristram Shandy (Volume 3).pdf/194

 would serve him but to heat my uncle Toby's too.

My uncle Toby would give my father all possible fair play in this attempt; and with infinite patience would sit smoaking his pipe for whole hours together, whilst my father was practising upon his head, and trying every accessible avenue to drive Prignitz and Scroderus's solutions into it.

Whether they were above my uncle Tobys reason,—or contrary to it,—or that his brain was like wet tinder, and no spark could possibly take hold,—or that it was so full of saps, mines, blinds, curtins, and such military disqualifications to his seeing clearly into Prignitz and Scroderuss doctrines,—I say not, let school men—scullions, anatomists, and